On Commercial Advertisement and Design Ethics

The infinite design originality and the relatively finite natural resources is a pair of contradiction. This contradiction will be aggravated when the “people oriented” design philosophy has changed to “people’s con.sumption oriented” in reality. Viewing commercial advertisement from the perspective of design ethics, we can find that the advertisement with the goal of sales promotion is unilateral and violates the path of sustainable development. The nature and final goal of commercial advertisement and design is not to stimulate consumption blindly, but to advocate green consumption concept and harmonious way of life. The benign ethical guidance of advertisement can create a healthy and harmonious ecological environment between advertisement design and commercial consumption. Only by this way can the long-term benefits of commercial design be reflected. Keywords—design ethics; commercial advertisement; consumption; ecological